“RE-RE: RESHAPING THE NOTION OF RESISTANCE” - PUBLIC PROGRAMME SERIES FOR A HUNDRED YEARS OF SHAME

“Re-Re: Reshaping the Notion of Resistance” is a series of programmes accompanying the exhibition, A Hundred Years of Shame – Songs of Resistance and Scenarios for Chinese Nations currently on view at Para Site. The series consists of three events, each exploring from different perspectives the appropriate attitudes of artistic creation and cultural production in the face of nationalism.

For the first event, Para Site invites Fei Da Wei (curator and art critic), Chiang Po Shin (Assistant Professor at Tainan National University of the Arts), and Anthony Yung (co-curator of A Hundred Years of Shame and Senior Researcher at Asia Art Archive) to discuss issues about Chinese identity in the resurgence of nationalism in China. Does this call for national spirit facilitate a specific identification? Or is it an ideology for liberation? In addition, apart from “resistance”, what kind of “metonymy” should be adopted?

For the second event, Para Site invites two artists from Hong Kong, Kwan Sheung Chi and Wong Wai Yin to talk about resistance, either through making art in daily life or living daily life more artistically, raising the question of how art, as a medium, can perform its role in social activities. What are the changes in artistic representation and artists’ positions after the significant social movement that took place last year in Hong Kong?

The third and final event in the series includes a concert from the Guangdong-based indie folk band Wutiaoren and guests. Preceding the performances is a conversation between cultural critic Chang Tieh Chih and Wutiaoren to discuss the development of independent bands in mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan, as well as the formation of the fictional record label “Xi Kang Records,” which was established especially for A Hundred Years of Shame. Named after the subversive scholar and musician of the Three Kingdoms period, Xi Kang (223–262 CE), the label represents a wide variety of recording artists who produce music of discontent from across the Chinese-speaking world, selected by Chang and Wutiaoren, in addition to sound culture and independent music researchers and curators Amy Cheng and Jeph Lo; and independent musicians Lam P (My Little Airport) and Mei Er (Top Floor Circus).

Event details:Please note that the discussions will be conducted in Chinese.

SpeakersFei Da Wei is a curator and art critic. Major curatorial projects by Fei include Chine Demain pour Hier (1990, Pourrières, France), Exceptional Passage (1991, Fukuoka), Promenade in Asia I & II (1994 and 1997, Tokyo) and The Monk and the Demon (2004, Lyon Contemporary Art Museum). He was the founding director of the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art (UCCA) in Beijing, and curated the Center’s first exhibition in 2007, 85 New Wave, a large-scale historical retrospective. He currently lives and works in Beijing and Paris.

Chiang Po Shin is Assistant Professor at Tainan National University of the Arts, he is also the editor-in-chief of Art Critique Taiwan (ACT). Chiang’s recent work focuses on left-wing movements and visual documentation from the 1920s, contemporary art curation and biopolitics, and contemporary visual art and activism in East Asia. He currently lives and works in Tainan.

Anthony Yung is co-curator of A Hundred Years of Shame – Songs of Resistance and Scenarios for Chinese Nations, and Senior Researcher at Asia Art Archive, specializing in China related archival projects. His published writings focus on critical practices in Chinese and Hong Kong contemporary art, and he is the awardee of The Fourth Yishu Awards for Critical Writing on Contemporary Chinese Art (2014). Yung is also co-founder of Observation Society, an independent art space in Guangzhou.

Kwan Sheung Chi was born in 1980 in Hong Kong, and received third class Honors in Fine Art from The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) in 2003 and failed to qualify for the MFA programme at CUHK in 2004 and 2007. In 2000 he was named the “King of Hong Kong New Artist;” in 2002 Kwan Sheung Chi Touring Series Exhibitions, Hong Kong toured to 10 major exhibition venues in Hong Kong; and in the same year, the Hong Kong Art Centre presented A Retrospective of Kwan Sheung Chi. Kwan was a founding member of local art groups, Hong Kong Arts Discovery Channel (HKADC), hkPARTg (Political Art Group) and Woofer Ten. In 2009, he was awarded the Starr Foundation Fellowship from the Asian Cultural Council and was the winner of the inaugural Hugo Boss Asia Art Prize in 2013. Kwan’s artworks have not been widely exhibited around the world, and he has never participated in any major exhibitions held internationally.

Wong Wai Yin graduated from The Chinese University of Hong Kong in 2004, and The University of Leeds, UK (Master of Fine Art) in 2005. Wong experiments with a variety of media, ranging from painting, sculpture, collage, installations and photography. She has exhibited her works extensively in Hong Kong, as well as in Japan, United States, Singapore, and Guangzhou.

Chang Tieh Chih is a political and cultural critic from Taiwan, and is the chief editor of City Magazine in Hong Kong. His publications include Sound and Fury: Can Rock & Roll Change the World?, The Sound of Resistance: From Bob Dylan to U2, and The Times they are A-changing：Democracy, market and the power of imagination.

Para Site fully supports the democratic aspirations of the people of Hong Kong.

Para Site is financially supported by the Springboard Grant under the Arts Capacity Development Funding Scheme of the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.

The content of this activity does not reflect the views of the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.